Gym price discrimination • Hacker News Board

Re: Gym price discrimination

#41

Post by easp » Sun, Feb 14, 2010, 10:50 PM UTC

callmeed wrote: post #27

I think the author is wrong in thinking a "swiped at the door" and "no sales staff" is a better model. Most gyms make their money locking people into annual contracts in exchange for a slightly lower monthly fee. This is especially true for "full-featured" gyms with lots of classes and staff. The only way his idea works is for the 24 hour/keycard type of gym where only 1 employee is needed and there are no instructor…

I think that the gym's techniques for gaming customers also benefit by aligning with customer's attempts to motivate themselves. At least some customers are aware that paying in advance could motivate them to go to the gym more often.

Re: Gym price discrimination

#42

Post by lsc » Mon, Feb 15, 2010, 8:19 AM UTC

jonsteinberg wrote: post #37

lsc wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

why? Shared hosting, /in theory/ could provide better service levels than dedicated servers, simply because it is a whole lot easier to make a standard shared hosting setup redundant than it is to make a dedicated server redundant.

yes thx

I mean, you've got to watch it, as in reality, shared hosting providers have a reputation for providing a lower level of service, not because it's difficult to provide a good shared hosting experience, but because they make most of their money off monthly fees rather than per-usage fees (as the more 'cloudy' shared hosting, like google app engine does) - so traditional shared hosting places have an incentive to oversubscribe their services, and to lose their heavier (cpu and I/O) users.

But then, it's pretty cheap and easy to have two shared hosting accounts, and to switch between them with DNS as required, and that solves a whole lot of those problems.

Re: Gym price discrimination

#43

Post by OmniLarry » Tue, Feb 16, 2010, 4:48 PM UTC

jonsteinberg wrote: post #36

bonsaitree wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Actually, they may not be making ANY money off of his friend. Most 'charter' deals and seasonal specials are loss-leaders for gyms. The former, as part of the initially pre-financed membership drive and the latter when they're already below break-even capacity on a per-membership basis. Keep in mind he's asking for more than a 8.5% discount on the stated price even before excluding the bogus initiation fee.

Dan was not a charter member. But I think you're right about "lull period." Yes I understand the whole 80/20 usage scenario. My point is just that it's price discrimination that doesn't work. Soda at a supermarket vs. restaurant works because of location. This is just a bluff on the gym's part.

I was actually a charter member at the Union Square Crunch gym (the one on 3rd anyhow). Quitting was easy though, they only asked why (because I hadn't been going) and that was that.

Re: Gym price discrimination

#44

Post by teye » Sat, Mar 13, 2010, 2:26 AM UTC

rlpb wrote: post #40

teye wrote: post #26

Recently experienced this with 24 Hour Fitness in SF. Visited the location to sign up for the $199/yr my buddy paid. "That promotion [wasn't] currently running," but I got a call two days later saying that it was back on. It's a shame to delay a customer like me who'll wait for the better price, but I bet you lose a lot of low-hanging fruit if you make the better price available permanently. Without the system, event…

Are you sure that's what actually happened? It sounds to me that they were trying to negotiate a higher price, realised that you weren't going to take it (when you didn't) and so you effectively negotiated them back down to $199/yr.

That's what I thought too, but I saw the ordering system both times (before manipulation, immediately after boot-up) and the annual price was higher the first time and $199 the second time.